Corpse Priest
by Demolitron
Summary: Oori's forbidden love begins to drag him down into darkness and Makina's inexorable march towards eternal hell continues as they both fight death. How far will Oori go and how far will Makina let him?


"MAKINA," Kagami Oori, a Kougun Contracted Priest, screamed into the black night. "MAKINA," he screamed again and again into that abyssal wall of darkness that surrounded him. "Don't Makina, don't kill that corpse!" He started to run, stumbling blindly forward, searching desperately for the glowing blue En that connected him with Hoshimura Makina. Faint, ever so faint, the glowing light led him onward. He could hear artificially muted gunfire growing louder with each stride he took.

"Makina," he frantically pleaded in his mind, "don't do this. Don't throw it away like this. Don't throw it all away for nothing!"

Suddenly he plowed into a hard rubbery wall that smelled like rotten flesh. Oori knew right away, this was the rotting flesh of a corpse. The muscles below the surface of the putrid corpse he'd run into slid and rippled under the fetid sack of skin it used to hold itself together. Oori stepped backward to catch his balance and swung his staff in front of himself, preparing to engage in battle. But, he was too late. A boney hand found itself around his torso and snatched him into the air. Oori, still blind tried to sense his surroundings but the cursed space they were in blinded him in every way possible.

Then, gunshots rang out. He could hear Makina unleashing a battle cry as the bullets sprayed from her twin MAC-11 machine guns. Some of the bullets struck the corpses flesh. Enough had torn through its forearm so that is lost most of its grip strength and Oori manages to pry himself free. Through the air Oori fell into the black. Without any sight he didn't know how high he was and the ground below was shrouded in mystery. Before he expected it, hard rock smashed into his side and his skull made a hollow thud as it rebounded off of a patch of hard packed clay. The world spun violently now. Without sight and any sense of balance he was vulnerable and he knew it. On hands and knees she clambered across the ground away from where he heard the action of battle. He just needed to regain himself.

Pain, sharp and urgent, raced across his body starting at his left side and rampaging to the tips of his toes. Unable to steady himself he crumpled to the ground and rolled onto his back. He reached down and felt wetness. It was sticky and thick. It was blood. He probed further and found the hole in his robes. He pushed inside and found his flesh and the matching hole in his skin. He'd been shot.

Makina was reaching out to him; he could feel their En become stronger. She needed him now; she needed his energy to fight with her curse. With the stronger connection Oori could feel her blinded rage towards this corpse. She wanted to destroy it and nothing else would stand before that desire. Oori was close, much closer than expected. Briefly, Makina took note of this, "Oori! You idiot," she screamed loud enough to barley be heard through the miasma. "You were supposed to stay back! You're in the way. Get out of here now before you get killed!"

More gunfire cut off the rest of her words. Oori was glad for it. He didn't need the berating right now. Right now he needed to concentrate on surviving long enough to stop Makina from killing this corpse. This was not in the plan. "Makina!" he shouted. This time he was close enough he knew she could hear him. The gunfire has ceased momentarily as she jumped from position to position around the corpse.

"Makina, don't kill this corpse! Let the others do it Makina. Save what little we have left for Houkuto." The gunfire roared into life again as she went for broke. Determined to put and end to this atrocity of death. Then Oori heard it. It was as clear to him as a temple bell being struck. Makina's garbled grunt, her strangled scream, and the bubbling of her blood as her dead body reacted to the pain of being impaled. God how Oori hated being able to know that just from the sound she made.

Gritting his teeth he stood with a great effort. The time had long past for this and he now only hoped he had the strength left to do it. Closing his eyes, his mind, his ears, even his sense of touch, Oori drifted into the void of meditation and found the power of the stars and heavens. He collected to power of his friends, his family, and his love for everyone. Then, he released it. A white brilliant sphere of purifying energy emanated from his entire being and in its wake the black miasma was burned away and the pure light of mid-day reclaimed the area.

The corpse looked like a giant grotesque cockroach with large hands on the ends of each of its legs. The wholesome light of the sun was painful to its body that had been so used to the sick darkness of its artificial crypt womb. Makina laughed out loud, "Ha! Found you!"

She was dangling from one of the corpse's long boney fingers. Her torso had been run through and her legs hung like limp scraps of meat on a hook. She smiled broadly as she pulled the trigger and a rapid succession of bullets flew into the head of the corpse. One by one they pushed into the flesh and imparted enough kinetic energy to spray it in all directions. The brains blasted out the back of its skull and splattered everything in its path.

A sick oozing grey yellow filth covered Oori drug himself out of the pool of vile gore he had been thrown into. The pain in his side was growing more intense and it was getting harder to breath. On the ground in front of him he saw Makina's boots as she stepped besides him.

"Oori," she scolded. "You should have stayed back like I said. You're already next to useless in a fight and I need your energy to power my curse." She examined him for a moment and then turned him over with her foot. "Did you get impaled by it," she asked while looking at the trail of blood along the ground.

"Makina," he gasped. "That was the one hundred and seventh corpse you've killed!" He chocked back the tears and pain he felt from his wound…and his heart. "Now there's none left after you kill Houkuto. You'll turn into a Breaker!" He couldn't hold back a small scream when a sharp pain lanced his side.

"What about your injury?" she asked while bending down over him. She was looking him over, trying the find the wounds. Oori could smell her. It wasn't pleasant, but he liked it. It was the smell of a corpse but it was also the smell of Makina. She wasn't warm, not in the slightest, but he felt her presence and her closeness. A happiness tainted by intense longing and heartache washed over him.

"It's my left side," he said. "There's no exit wound Makina. The bullet is still inside me."

Makina stopped and cursed quietly. "That's why you needed to stay AWAY!" She was angry now, angry at herself and at Oori. "Those bullets aren't ordinary Oori…"

"I know," he interrupted. "I helped put the curse on those you know. It's a curse that makes them all the more deadly to corpses." He grit his teeth against a new wave of pain. "And, even though I'm not a corpse, I do host a large number of them inside me. So, this bullet's going to kill me if we don't get it out now."

The pain was intense. So much so that Oori's vision started to fade around the edges. The veil of blindness closed down further and further. In those last moments he saw Makina's face. She was staring at him. Her eyes were anger, her mouth contempt, but the small left over bit of her face was worry. His eyes closed and in the distance he heard the sound of footsteps running.


End file.
